Relationships Archives

What I Learned From My Ex-Boyfriend’s Ex-Girlfriend

By Ariel Rathjen

A conversation until 4:00 am with a girl I could formerly not look in the eyes taught me a lot about myself.

You see, the last interaction I had with her I was slapping her new boyfriend square across the face.

She dated the guy that I shared everything short of a last name with.

But, not for long after that.

What I learned from her after that night has changed my life forever.

This story is not a story of love and love lost, rather a story of empowerment.

After our late night conversation I was on a high for the rest of the week.

Could the girl I formerly hated suddenly be one of my best friends?

Is she really that nice?

She had every reason in the world to hate me, but I got only forgiveness and love from her since the start of our budding relationship.

Inevitably, our conversation happened long after she broke up with this boy and was full of lots of tears, honesty and healing.

It seems as though we should have or could have bonded over the common pain that we had endured, but this did not end up being the case.

We ended up filing the friendship void for one another that we realized that we both had.

Both of my best friends had just moved away, and she was going through the beginning of her transitional post- grad life.

We began going out together, watching movies together, and she began to be the girl that I knew would ALWAYS come around when I needed her.

But how did we get to this point?

Honestly, our relationship is still a bit of a miracle in terms of the typical social hierarchy. Our interactions should have involved hair pulling and yelling, right?

Wrong.

I think that what makes our relationship so special is the fact that we realized that strong friendships can overcome anything, start any way and are one of the most important relationships that you will make in college.

No boy or social norm can determine who we can be friends with.

True friendship boils down to the heart- unconditional love, fierce faithfulness and no judgement.

Never forget that.

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: Vanni Bassetti/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

So What Is A Sapiosexual Exactly?

By Sonam Ahluwalia

Sapiosexual.

It’s a word that’s in vogue right now.

From Tumblr pages to Tinder profiles, lots of people are claiming to be members of this shadow group.

Urban Dictionary (a fairly reputable source in these matters) defines a sapiosexual as “one who finds intelligence the most sexually attractive feature”.

Riiight….

So sapiosexuality is a term that has been coined in order to describe a group of people who value intelligence over other sexual features such as face structure, body build, performance, aura, and many other components involved in sexual attraction.

People love to identify with something on social media, so this new term adds to the vocabulary list available when describing yourself to others.

“You read so good. Have my babies.” Photo Credit: Marketa/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

However, this term has also sparked controversy.

Some folks don’t believe that you can actually be a sapiosexual and that calling yourself one is merely pretentious and offensive because people are categorized according to their intelligence.

This counter argument goes: how can something so demeaning be considered an acceptable option as a preference in matters of sexual attraction?

Plus, can you be with someone only because they are smart?

Don’t ask many college freshmen that question.

But we can take a different route when looking at this newly fashioned term.

The definition from Urban Dictionary refers to a sapiosexual as someone who values intelligence as the “most sexually attractive feature”.

This does not mean that it is the only aspect we look at somebody.

For many people intelligence is certainly important in a relationship. and having a sexual stimulation from intellect is not a stand alone sexual orientation for them but rather an element of deeper feelings.

“She never remembers to wear shoes but she has a really good handle on thermal dynamics. xo.” Photo Credit: Ulisse Albiati/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

Sapiosexuality can vary among people because intelligence varies, and so does the expectations of the level of intelligence one has for their partner.

For example, a lawyer may consider him or herself a sapiosexual for readers while a car mechanic sees him or herself a sapiosexual for people that know a lot about cars.

The incredible variation of what one finds as intelligence stems from the commonalities people have when looking for a partner.

If two people both love to identify plants while hiking, then they value that type of knowledge.

The vast diversity in intellectual interests actually works with the ambiguous definition of sapiosexuality.

Thus, you can be a sapiosexual.

But most of us are already.

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: Pedro Ribeiro Simões/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

Is Bumble Really More Empowering For Women Than Tinder?

By Adrienne Thompson

Finding true love just got easier due to the latest trend of dating apps available on smart phones.

Users are literally finger tips away from connecting with the right person, but who will make the first move?

There is a broad range of dating app, such as OK Cupid and Tinder, but the app that caught my attention was Bumble, often referred to by many as the “feminist app.”

It works just like any other dating app, where users set up a profile of themselves and swipe right if they have an interest in someone.

But here’s the catch, women make the first move.

Men and women both make their own connections, but once a connection is made, women only have a span of 24 hours to initiate a conversation before the connection disappears.

Then men only have 24 hours to respond to that first move by the woman.

But is the ability to make the first move more empowering for women?

For many yes, women have the control in this scenario, making men wait by the phone for the first response.

It is a total inversion of the typical dating app experience in that way.

Women at a Bumble event in Melbourne, Australia. Photo Credit: Bumble/ Facebook

Women have men wrapped around their fingers waiting for that first text message.

Dating is not easy and having the courage to be the first one to reach out to a possible connection can boost the confidence of many women.

Bumble changes the stereotypical role of waiting three days for the guy to call, pushing for women to take action within a 24 hour time frame.

For others, being the first to say “Hello” is easier said than done.

For those too shy to make the first move then have a limited time frame before the connection is lost.

There is pressure to initiate the conversation, which for many can feel more disappointing than empowering.

Some simply have no idea what to say, which happens sometimes, and that should be okay.

Everyone has different experiences with dating apps, both good and bad, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Many women have reported good feedback from using Bumble and have had good conversations with their connections from going on dates to just establishing friendships.

That is the beauty of dating apps you have control to choose the person you want to have a connection with, and Bumble offers a different perspective on who makes the first move.

There is no instruction manual or rule book to follow when it comes to finding love, and everyone is entitled to go about that journey the way they choose.

So is Bumble more empowering for women than Tinder?

It certainly has the potential to be.

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: Bumble/ Facebook

Confessions Of A Tinder Ghosting Queen

By Ariel Rathjen

Picture two lonely twenty- somethings, 2.4 miles away from each other, both struggling through the end of tumultuous relationships.

Two lonely people seeking very different things- one of us had good intentions, and one of us had none.

I was your typical tinder troll.

I was the QUEEN of ghosting boys on Tinder, and, unfortunately, Michael was the result of one of my most crafty “drink and ditch” plans.

My life as a Tinder ghost went through many phases but it ended in an incredibly unlikely way.

The Broken Hearted

I would venture to say that this is the most popular group of people responsible for Tinder ghosting.

These are the guys/ girls that will text/ snapchat you all the time.

They’ll make plans to meet up, but chicken out at the last second.

When I matched with Michael in the summer of 2015, I had just broken up with the guy that I had been dating off and on since high school.

My best friend convinced me to download Tinder “just for fun.”

I didn’t think I needed it, but I went along with it anyway.

The night I downloaded Tinder, I got a message from Michael.

He was going out and wanted to meet up.

I was freaked out about the whole idea of it, so I thought maybe I would just take a free drink for my best friend and I and ditch.

When we met up, he was a true gentlemen, he bought us drinks and we chugged them.

We left shortly after, and about an hour later, he saw me hanging out with another guy.

Although it may not sound like a valid excuse, I can assure you that the broken- hearted do not understand the damage that they may be causing.

These people are hurting and they probably cannot yet identify what a good guy/ girl looks like.

These people are looking for love, but still need to heal.

The Attention Seeker

This one is all of us to some extent.

Tinder is a great daily ego booster.

I don’t know of any other place where you can experience a variety of cheesy pickup lines crafted just for you (or used on 10 other people), get told how pretty you are, and rummage through hundreds of messages, choosing whom to reply.

Hangout two with Michael happened about six months later.

I had deleted and re- downloaded the app more than a handful of times since we had last seen one another.

This time, I had moved on from the heart break category, into the “home alone over Christmas break” attention seeking category.

I was out with a friend one night, and he was too.

So, I went over to where he was to meet him (and get free drink number two).

We talked for a bit, but then my friend needed me, so I left to be with her.

Later on in the night I saw him walking around with his friends, and I walked the other direction.

The attention seekers like things to be on their terms.

They only want you when they’re lonely or need the ego boost.

Attention seekers can get better over time, though, so don’t write them off right away.

Get to know these people, sometimes it might take a few tries to crack their seemingly egotistical shell.

The Gold Digger

Watch out for this one.

People like to blame this one on females, but I think this can be everyone.

This is the group of people that are unwilling to meet up UNLESS there is something good in it for them ie: dinner, drinks, entertainment.

They won’t just join you at the dog park or for a movie, they need some kind of incentive, and they get a high off of using other people.

When hangout number three with Michael happened, I was going into it with the intentions of more free drinks.

By this time, it had already been a year of enduring my ghosting, and he was pretty much sick of me.

However, one night, a freshly 21 Ariel partied a little too hard, and ran into some “medical” trouble.

I remembered that Michael worked in a hospital, so I texted him asking if I was going to die.

Turns out I was just fine, and the reassurance that he had my back was really moving to me.

So, ~finally~ date number one happened, and, (gold digger that I formerly was) ended up asking to pay for the drinks.

And, the rest is history.

You see, if Michael had not contacted me the second time we matched, even though I had already ditched him, I never would be with him today.

We have been dating for almost a year now and I cannot imagine a single second without him.

If he had not pursued me or had just begun ignoring me like I did him, we would not be as happy as we are today.

Sometimes the people who are unwilling to meet up are just gun- shy from their last relationship/ experience and need a little time.

They need a little forgiveness and understanding.

Trust your gut, though, and if it feels like you are being used, you probably are.

Of course, it could end up being love at first (or second) ghost too.

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: Jordi Carrasco/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

Does Tinder Prove That “True Love” Is A Myth?

By Logan Ansteatt

Online dating can be a minefield.

Fake accounts, bad intentioned users and conversations that can only be classified as cringeworthy.

But for those using apps like Tinder, finding a legitimate connection with someone can be hindered by a factor you don’t always think about; your location.

What happens if your search range on the app is 25 miles, but your “true love” is 26 miles away?

Sure, that may be overthinking it, but just like in real life, it’s a real possibility that you could be passing by your potential significant other simply because they’re located slightly outside your search distance.

There are 1.4 billion swipes and 26 million matches per day on Tinder.

One of those matches lead to Arianna Johnson meeting her husband Ben.

Arianna said she wasn’t expecting to meet her future husband through Tinder.

Photo Credit: @markheybo/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

She had been using the app for a year on and off, going on a few dates, with three turning into what she considers actual relationships.

At the time, Arianna had her search distance maxed out to 100 miles.

“I did it because it allows for potential matches,” Arianna said.

Arianna recalls Ben being around 20 to 30 miles away from her when the two originally matched.

For Arianna, distance wasn’t going to be the biggest hurdle in meeting someone, but talking to a stranger might have been.

“When you go to a coffee shop…you don’t know if a person is single or taken,” Arianna said. “It’s ‘hard to talk to a total stranger…If I saw my husband in public without Tinder, I probably would have never gone up to talk to him.”

Unfortunately for the rest of us, cases like Arianna and Ben’s serve as an outlier to overall online dating statistics.

According to Pew Research, only 5% of Americans who are married or are in committed relationships say they met their significant other online.

The good news is, Pew Research also indicates that online dating has lost much of its negative stigma, with only 23% of American adults believing people who use online dating sites are desperate, and 59% now say that Online dating is a good way to meet people.

So now we can swipe away without the majority of people giving us the stare down.

Small victories right?

Arianna Johnson met her husband Ben on Tinder.

You should be worrying about the truly important things when using online dating.

Things like coming up with a witty pick-up line they’ve never heard of before, or making sure your pictures and bio page describe you as the perfect match, straying away from the hyperbolic nonsense that would lead your date to realize you are way lamer than they initially thought.

In all seriousness, the biggest obstacle preventing you from meeting that special someone might still be starting that initial conversation.

Stressing about missing your “true love” because you didn’t set your search distance high enough is superfluous.

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.

Cover Photo Credit: Connie Ma/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

This New Carly Rae Jepsen Music Video Just Made An Important Point About Modern Relationships

By Staff Report

Carly Rae Jepsen doesn’t have to be one of your favorite musicians (or even someone you can stand) for you to appreciate what she is doing with her latest music video.

The video for the song “Boy Problems” is a throwback of sorts to a 1980s slumber party scene. But it also features plenty of selfies, laptop computers and tablets.

While the song is ostensibly just about those moments when you just can’t stand your friend talking about her troubles with boys, it can also be read in a deeper way.

Perhaps Jepsen is trying to point out how silly modern drama about relationships and social pressures tied to those moments really are.

We shouldn’t be so hung up on another person that we lose sight of ourselves and our own emotional well being. And in the end, drama is such a waste of time and energy.

Anyway, watch the video and tell us in the comments whether you think our theory makes any sense:

RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us!

Cover Photo Credit: Carly Rae Jepsen/ Facebook (Screenshot)

Here’s What Valentine’s Day Is Like For A Person In A Polyamorous Relationship

By Contributor

By Julia Fox

Still believe that exclusivity is necessary for deep, committed, long-term and loving relationships? The modern divorce rate of 50% says otherwise.

As traditional Valentine’s Day-themed pink and red greeting cards replace the tired Christmas & New Year colors on the stands of stores, most of us are anticipating (or dreading) the invasion of our social networks and television with the typical romantic scenarios of exchanging gifts, kisses and love messages between two lovers of the opposite or the same sex. Very few of us ever imagine the holiday routine in relationships where there are more than two lovers involved.

The images of cheating two-timers running between the deceived spouse and the scheming mistress aside, we are hardly bombarded nowadays by pictures of non-traditional family unions, such as polyamorous families, where the conventional Valentine’s day gift exchange is a little bit more complicated.

Polyamorous unions where ethical and responsible non-monogamy… are estimated to have around 1.2 to 2.4 million followers in the United States alone.

Polyamorous unions where ethical and responsible non-monogamy is practiced with knowledge and consent of everyone involved are estimated to have around 1.2 to 2.4 million followers in the United States alone.

How do polyamorous relationships come about? I am sure it is rarely a case of waking up one morning with your partner snoring by your side and deciding ‘why not add to the duo.’ The stories of people entering into the polyamorous unions are as many and varied as those embarking on conventional ones.

The beginning of my polyamorous relationship was a case of almost choking on toast one morning after my husband of 10 years admitted to having a homosexual relationship back in his college years with a Ukrainian man named Sasha.

Skipping through the finding Sasha story and straight into the reality of maintaining a household and a life with two partners and, yes, surviving a Valentine’s day together, the polyamorous relationship with a bi-sexual partner and a homosexual one who spent all of his life in the closet became an adventure for me worth sharing.

Almost all of us enter into a romantic union with the desire to be happy and to make our partners happy. Unfortunately, helping Sasha “come out of the closet” and leave the Ukraine was a huge struggle due to the severe psychological repercussions of concealing his sexuality since he was a young teen.

Photo Credit: Roy Blumenthal/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)

Dreading being ostracized by the community, fearing shame, physical torture and even imprisonment, creating a heterosexual family and dissociating himself from the gay community altogether made Sasha (and many thousands of his compatriots) the broken man that he was when he joined our family. Thus, welcoming Sasha into our union and expecting a ‘happy-ever-after’ was just as irrational as anticipating an unclouded happiness in any relationship once the wedding bells quiet down.

Each person comes into a relationship, whether it is a traditional one or less then so, with one’s own baggage of expectations based on childhood memories, literature, social media and a load of personal traumatic experiences and their consequences, and thus Sasha joined us with the full baggage of his own.

Being forced into a traditional marriage by his parents and living his life as a heterosexual man affected Sasha’s mental health and contributed to the development of a whole range of mental issues, such as dissociation, depression, internalized homophobia, self-disgust, self-hatred and denial of one’s sexual orientation to oneself and others. There conditions are commonplace in persons with repressed sexual orientation, according to many prominent psychiatrists.

Sasha exhibited all kinds of issues, such as low self-esteem, negative body image and contempt for the more open LGBT members who decided to come out years before. More importantly, Sasha had a tendency to deny that homophobia was a serious social problem altogether. Remaining in a heterosexual relationship for most of his life in an attempt to pass as ‘normal’ and to gain social approval, Sasha became chronically depressed and took to heavy drinking. His fear of intimacy and his suicidal thoughts presented a bigger challenge and a threat to our union.

My brief relationship with Sasha opened my eyes to the many aspects of homosexuality and the life paths that LGBT men and women choose in the parts of the world where homosexuality is still considered an abnormality.

My brief relationship with Sasha opened my eyes to the many aspects of homosexuality and the life paths that LGBT men and women choose in the parts of the world where homosexuality is still considered an abnormality.

The freedoms that sexual minorities are enjoying in the majority of democratic countries today are precious and unheard of in such places as Ukraine, Russia, Belorussia, Azerbaijan and other post-Soviet territories. Giving American LGBT members a glimpse into the lives of those who are less fortunate and still struggle for their rights might be an eye-opening experience this Valentine’s day.

Sasha’s arrival in our life, the life of a typical monogamous heterosexual couple, meant re-imagining our relationship, challenging traditional marriage, sexuality and love itself. All three of us had to learn to navigate and explore the challenges and complexities of a polyamorous reality together against a backdrop of cultural and societal expectations and judgments.

Examining and questioning the dynamic and often challenging elements of marriage, relationships and acceptance, are just a few issues that polyamorous unions might bring out into the discussion.

Julia Fox immigrated from Russia in her late teens, settling in the United States in the early 90s. She published two books of poetry before leaving her home country, both in Russian, and published two more in English language after immigrating. And Then There Were Three: Sixty Seven Letters to Sasha is her first autobiographical memoir.

For more information about And Then There Were Three: Sixty-Seven Letters to Sasha, please visit Julia Fox’s website, Facebook and Twitter pages.

Cover Photo Credit: Roy Blumenthal/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)